


THE PUPPETS OF FRANKENSTEIN

by SheliakBob



Category: Bride of Frankenstein - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-12-01 21:28:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11495106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SheliakBob/pseuds/SheliakBob
Summary: Shortly after the end of "Bride of Frankenstein", Henry and Elizabeth hide with a traveling carnival, posing as puppeteers.





	THE PUPPETS OF FRANKENSTEIN

**Author's Note:**

> This work uses concepts and characters from the unused "Return of Frankenstein" story treatment submitted by L. G. Blockman.  
> A couple of scenes and paragraphs are lifted almost entirely from that work.

THE PUPPETS OF FRANKENSTEIN  
The traveling carnival rolled into Goldstadt two days ago and today, just like the day before, the biggest attraction were the marvelous “Heinrich Puppets.” Puppeteers Victor Heinrich and his wife Elsa worked out of the wagon that was their theater, their workshop, and their living quarters. A panel on the side folded out on struts to reveal the puppet stage. Children, and more than a few adults, crowded close to watch the amazingly life-like puppets go through their paces.   
The story was fairly trivial, even cliche. There was a Queen who resisted the advances of her overly amorous King while a beleaguered-looking Archbishop raced about flailing his arms and blowing a whistle trying to prevent the royal couple from consummating their union right there on the stage, in front of a crowd of impressionable children. The Devil stood off to one side, occasionally offering advice to the King and making droll observations.   
Between acts a beautiful little Ballerina appeared and danced to Mendelssohn’s “Spring Song.”  
The story was inconsequential. What people crowded in to see were the puppets themselves. Exquisitely crafted, their features were so fine and detailed, their motions so unnervingly natural that onlookers would swear that they were actually alive, if it weren’t for the visible wires attached to them and the occasional jerks and hops as they performed. That the Heinrichs did all of the voices themselves was painfully obvious but the crowd was willing to forgive their sometimes comically amateurish attempts at vocal characterizations just to watch the puppets. Whoever created the puppets had been gifted with rare and wonderful genius.  
Carnival workers plied the crowd with wicker baskets in hand, collecting fares and donations from the crowd. The puppet show was taking in almost as much money as the whole rest of the carnival combined.   
Eventually the King finally grabbed his Queen while the Archbishop buried his face in his hands and the Devil applauded. Curtains fell as the royal couple kissed. A side curtain opened up with the Ballerina spinning through her dance for a couple of minutes, then that curtain closed and the main curtains opened again. Now, though, the stage was filled with a glass tank full of real water. Inside, a perfectly formed little Mermaid sat on the rocks waving at the crowd. Lights came on behind the glass tank and the slightly distorted faces of Victor and Elsa Heinrich appeared behind it. They beamed at the wildly applauding crowd and took their bows by nodding their heads. Elsa Heinrich waved a hand holding the marionette control rod, which made the Mermaid lift her arms and sway from side to side.  
Then the light went out and the curtains closed for good on that day’s performances.  
The crowd roared their approval and the fare collectors were pelted by a veritable rain of coins. Eventually the crowd wandered off to check out the other attractions the carnival had to offer, lured by the smell of roasted nuts, fresh pretzels, and popcorn. The busy fare collectors dropped to their hands and knees to scour the ground for stray coins.

Henry Frankenstein and his wife Elizabeth laughed and hugged each other after the show, in the privacy of their caravan. The couple had been forced to go undercover, temporarily, to avoid the anger of the villagers from their hometown. Though the Baron and his wife had been as much the victims of Dr. Praetorious’ mad vision and the Monster’s cruel demands as anyone, the angry mob was not inclined to see it that way. It was Henry’s idea to procure the jars with Dr. Praetorious’ homunculi from the Doctor’s rooms in town and go undercover as “puppeteers.” The money their shows brought in bought the silence and complicity of Rudolph, the carnival’s owner. The renegade couple stayed to themselves as much as possible and avoided the other carnival workers when they could, but they had made a few friends among the performers.  
Working quickly with practiced hands, the couple untied and removed the wires that gave the illusion that they were controlling the homunculi on stage. However Praetorious had created them, he’d made the miniature beings amazingly compliant. Their black little eyes gave little indication of intelligence or will. Left to their own devices, the homunculi would perform their own little charades endlessly, tirelessly. They only required being walked through the puppet show routines a couple of times, guided by wires and prods, before mastering the movements perfectly. They performed six shows a day flawlessly, unvaryingly, and they likely could have done it many more times if not for the limitations of the couple’s vocal cords.  
“He’s torn her dress again!” Henry said, removing the wires from the little Queen’s arms and legs.  
Elizabeth sighed.   
She was busy trying to fish the Mermaid out of the large aquarium they used for the show, in order to transfer her back the glass canister that was usually her home. Tonight the little creature was being uncharacteristically willful and was not inclined to leave her more spacious surroundings. Elizabeth chased her around the tank with a long-handled aquarium net, but she kept evading capture, darting and spinning about at remarkable speeds. The tiny being had a wickedly gleeful look on her little face and actually stuck her tongue out at Elizabeth on three occasions.  
“Greta sewed up a replacement gown. It’s on the shelf next to the spare curtains.”  
Henry nodded and plucked the tiny garment from the shelf. Gently, he scooped up the Queen, who went limp in his hands, eyes open staring blankly at the ceiling. With the nimble fingers of a trained surgeon, Henry deftly removed the torn dress, which was hanging off one bare shoulder.   
Once again he marveled at how exquisitely the little Queen’s body was formed, perfect in every detail, the body of a beautiful woman rendered in a tiny simulacrum of flesh. Absent mindedly he ran a finger along her bare flank. The flesh was smooth and cool to the touch, its skin soft as a baby’s.  
“Do you need help with that?” Elizabeth asked, with a trace of bite in her voice.  
Henry blushed and smiled sheepishly.  
“Of course not.”  
He plucked up the new dress and pulled it on over the Queen’s head, gently lifting her limp arms to fit through the sleeves. The tiny body lie supine in his palm as he worked the dress down and over her hips. Tiny blank eyes still stared listlessly at the ceiling, but the Queen’s lips were slightly parted. Her tiny heart fluttered like a bird beneath his thumb on her chest.  
“All done!” he said with a boyish grin.  
Elizabeth was staring at him with worried eyes.  
The Mermaid, captured at last and hanging in the aquarium net, lolled about limply, all the fight and fierceness drained from her. She barely moved as Elizabeth dropped her into her water-filled canister. She floated like a drowning victim, arms slightly raised, hair spreading like a blonde stain through the water. The stare she gave Elizabeth was unblinking and utterly without emotion, but still somehow managed to seem like a glare.  
“Sometimes, these things make my skin crawl.” She said. “I’m not sure that being around them isn’t tainting us with whatever unnatural Black Magic Praetorius used to create them.”  
“Alchemy, my dear.”  
“Hmmm?”  
“Praetorius created them through Alchemy, not Black Magic.”  
Henry said the words with conviction, but his tone suggested that he harbored doubts about their origins as well.  
“Still,” He said with a smile. “They are keeping us fed and safe, so we owe them some measure of respect, even affection.”  
Elizabeth raised her eyebrow at the word “affection” but chose not to say anything out loud.

Outside, at the far end of the carnival, a barker shouted about the wonders contained within the main show tent. Gaudy banners writhed and snapped in the wind, advertising the presence of “Fifi the Giantess,” “Heta and Greta, the Siamese Twins,” and the prestidigitations of “Arnaldo the Magnificent.” A stranger in a long black coat with the collar turned up to muffle his face and an expensive hat pulled down almost over his eyes, slipped quietly through the crowd, patiently working his way to the barker’s side. Once he reached his goal, the stranger stood silently, waiting for a lull in the press of passing patrons.  
“Is Henry Frankenstein with you?”  
The stranger’s voice was an urgent whisper.  
The barker stared at the stranger in shock, before shaking his head.  
“Don’t know nobody by that name.” The barker said in a hoarse whisper.  
The stranger stared at him for several uncomfortable seconds before turning away with a shrug.  
The man stalked through the streets, his rigid posture and imperious bearing in stark contrast to the rough and tumble peasants thronging through the street fair around him. He ignored the food stands where others crowded in thick clusters. In the background a steam calliope wheezed through a barely recognizable rendition of “The Blue Danube Waltz.” Nearby a Trigane violinist fiddled soulfully, if discordantly, and a horse-faced spieler harangued the murmuring crowds about the extraordinary pliancy of “Egyptian” dancers. The stranger paused to whisper with Emma the Lion Tamer who paced restlessly in front of cages in which lions sprawled languidly, already bored with the stares of passersby. The coarse faced woman with close-cropped sandy hair laughed harshly and swiped playfully at him with her wound-up whip. The man frowned but continued on his way.  
Next the stranger grabbed a young blonde woman in pink silk tights by the shoulders, questioning her insistently. The young woman, Sari by name, was on her way to be sawn in half by the magician Arnaldo and had no time for his questions.  
Hans, the small bespectacled calliope player, who looked absolutely tiny at the keyboard of his huge steam piano, was more than happy to talk while he played, but the stranger could barely make out his words over the wheezing and skirling of the machine. In frustration, he turned abruptly and walked away. Hans kept talking for several minutes, unaware that his listener had left.  
The stranger paused in front of a garish, flare-lighted banner announcing the Heinrich Marionettes. Crude puppet characters painted on canvas seemed to almost dance as the wind rippled the banner. He stood there, a dark shape framed by sputtering white glare for several minutes before coming to some sort of decision.  
Checking to see that he was unobserved, the stranger slipped between carnival caravans parked along the square until he reached the one with Heinrich’s Marionettes painted along the sides. He knocked on the door, calling, “Henry! Henry Frankenstein!”  
Inside Henry and Elizabeth were hooking the threads of their marionette wands to tiny cleats in the top of the puppet stage. They looked at each other, eyes wide in alarm. The stranger continued to knock and call Henry’s name.  
Henry Frankenstein cleared his throat nervously, then answered using one of the voices he affected for the show.  
“There’s no one her by that name!” He said, without opening the door. “Have the decency to let us get some rest, whoever you are.”  
The stranger on the other side laughed.  
“It’s Victor, Henry. Victor Moritz! Isn’t that the same voice you used to use when mocking that pompous windbag, Professor Gorman? C’mon, Henry, open the door!”  
Elizabeth let out a sigh of relief and covered her mouth to suppress giggles.  
Slowly, Henry cracked the door open and peeked out.  
Victor was standing there, eyebrow raised, hat held aloft in one hand.  
“I’ve come to talk to you about appropriating my name, ‘Victor Heinrich!’”  
Henry laughed, despite himself. He threw open the door.  
“Come in, Victor. But for God’s sake hurry, and be quiet!”  
Moritz stepped into the caravan cabin, clasping first Henry then Elizabeth in heart-felt embraces.  
“Victor, how ever did you find us?”  
“You don’t think I’d let my dearest friend disappear without making every effort to find him?” Victor replied.  
He spoke to Henry, but his eyes were on Elizabeth.  
She blushed, but gave him a grateful smile.  
“I hope you don’t think,” said Henry with a prickling of wounded pride, “that my flight was from cowardice. I’m not the sort of man to let a pack of villagers drive me from my home.”  
“I understand.” Victor said hastily. “It was on account of Elizabeth. You did it to keep her safe. It’s the smartest and noblest thing you’ve ever done, Henry, and I respect you for that, I truly do.”  
Henry sighed, then sat on the bed wearily.  
“She’d already been through so much, on my account. I couldn’t see her suffer any more for my obsessions.”  
He then explained about his old professor, Septimus Praetorius and how the eccentric fellow had first proposed that they construct a mate for the Monster. Then how the Monster itself showed up, speaking, and demanded that he cooperate, or face losing his own mate. How Elizabeth had been kidnapped and hidden from him in a dank cave, bound and helpless, and he had been forced to return once more to the arts of sewing corpses together and calling the spark of Life out of angry clouds.  
People died and horrible unnatural evils were spawned. The watchtower with the secret laboratory blew to bits in a horrific explosion, killing all inside while he and Elizabeth barely escaped with their lives.  
Henry and Elizabeth watched the mob of villagers boiling through the trees toward the Frankenstein manor, torches in hand, an angry, seething flood of hatred raised against the couple, who had themselves been victims of madmen and monsters. They’d had no alternative but to escape out the back, down a brush-clogged gully and flee into the night.  
In the days that followed, the couple retrieved Praetorius’ living dolls and set themselves up as puppeteers, though neither of them knew a thing about actually staging marionette shows.  
“My God, Henry! I had no idea.”  
Victor stared in fascination at the “marionettes”, which were once again ensconced in their glass storage jars. The tiny beings stared back at him with their unblinking, expressionless eyes.  
Henry pulled a bottle out of a hamper and uncorked it.  
Elizabeth caught the cue and searched around until she found three clean glasses.  
“Frankenstein 1885.” Said Henry. “I managed to salvage two bottles when we left home. I’ve been saving them for a special occasion, like this.  
The three friends drank long into the night while the sounds of the carnival around them slowly died down, then fell silent.

Later that night, Elizabeth work with a start, her eyes wide in the moonlight, a thick blanket wrapped around her naked shoulders. Henry lie face down beside her, his bare back exposed by the blanket Elizabeth had wound about her in her sleep.  
Victor long ago said his good nights and retired to the rooms he’d rented at Goldstadt’s finest hotel. The couple declined his suggestion of relocating to similar lodgings in favor of their cozy caravan quarters.   
With Victor gone, Henry had been in quite high spirits and more passionate than usual. Elizabeth smiled and ran playful fingers through his dark hair.  
An odd prickling sensation rippled across her skin. Suddenly she was quite sure that she was being watched. Nervously she glanced around the moonlit cabin. She spotted the little King homunculus, who had somehow worked its way out of its covered glass canister and was standing on the edge of the shelf staring fixedly at her. The King slowly rubbed his round belly, his round, bearded face devoid of any expression.  
A cold chill rushed down her back and pooled in her belly. She pulled the blanket tighter around her, suddenly feeling painfully, vulnerably naked. The rotund homunculus quaked mirthfully and made odd squeaky little sounds that might have been chuckles.  
Frantically Elizabeth looked around the cabin, hunting for anything that could be used to swat the miniature lecher. By chance she caught sight of a roughly-whiskered, dirty face peering in through the caravan window. Bleary, drunken eyes were fixed upon her. A coarse tongue licked cracked lips.  
Horrible memories from her first, abortive wedding night came flooding back to her.  
Elizabeth screamed.  
Henry Frankenstein woke to the sound of his wife screaming and bounded out of bed, naked with clenched fists before he was even aware of his surroundings. A bestial, mad snarl was on his lips, his eyes glittered dangerously.  
“What’s wrong? What is it? Has it come back?” He shouted.  
A calming white hand touched him gingerly on the shoulder.  
“There was a face, at the window. One of the carnival workers, I think.” Elizabeth tried to sound calm, even though her heart was racing and terror was still prickling across her skin, pinching at her exposed chest.  
“Carnival worker?” Henry asked, blinking. “Which one? I’ll teach that peasant swine a thing or two!”  
Elizabeth shook her head, but Henry insisted on pulling on a robe and stalking about outside the caravan to ensure that no one was there.  
Elizabeth looked back to the shelf where she’d spotted the King watching her, but there was no sign of the homunculus. The shelf was bare, the canisters were all lined up in a row with their black satin covers in place. For just a second Elizabeth thought she heard squeaky whispering among the canisters and maybe a satin cover rippled in an unseen breeze. But she might have imagined it. Her nerves were still jangling like struck cymbals and the memory of a horrible, leering gray face, an inhuman face, leaning in toward hers was burnt across the inside of her eyes.  
She felt cold, dead hands gripping her shoulders. She was helpless, utterly helpless, pinned beneath a heavy dark shape. The grip on her shoulder ached in her skin, a tactile echo of a trauma months gone by. She couldn’t shake the feeling of being completely helpless, of having no control, the violation of her will almost as bad as the ravishing of her flesh. The cabin spun lazily to one side and shadows were closing in around her.  
Then Victor was back, holding her, whispering comforting words in her ear. She melted into his embrace.  
No!  
Not Victor. Henry. Henry was her husband. Victor wasn’t here. She’d chosen Henry.  
She buried herself in that embrace and lied to herself that it was the one she wanted.

The next day Elizabeth was left alone in the caravan while Henry and Victor went to settle some business about salvaging Henry’s estate while they remained in hiding. She busied herself tidying up the cabin and tending to the spare costumes for their “puppets.” Her fingers weren’t as nimble, her stitches not as tiny and precise as Greta’s, the carnival worker who crafted the miniature costumes, but she sewed well enough to manage repairs and the work relaxed her.  
While she worked, sewing up split seams and embroidering designs, she took the glass jars containing the Homunculi and sat them on the workbench next to the window. She removed their black satin covers so the little creatures could get some sunshine and fresh air.  
Henry told her to leave them covered, in darkness, as much as possible to keep them dormant and manageable. But Elizabeth thought it cruel to deny the little ones what semblance of a life they could enjoy. So much of their own safety depended on the performances of the “puppets”, Elizabeth felt that they owed the creatures the occasional free time in the sun.  
The little Ballerina twirled and danced tirelessly, performing to the music from a music box that Elizabeth sat near her canister. The Mermaid came to the front of her jar to bask in the sunlight. She endlessly brushed her platinum blonde hair and swam upside down so she could stare at the clouds with her unreadable glittering eyes. The little Queen and the King fanned themselves, squawking and squeaking at each other through the touching glass walls of their canisters. The King alternated between impassioned oratory and banging on the glass in frustration. The Queen smiled serenely and feigned indifference.  
Elizabeth laughed at their antics, amused by the simulacrum of amour Praetorius had succeeded in creating.  
The Archbiship and the Devil engaged in what Elizabeth had to assume was an impassioned debate on matters theological.  
The only one of the Homunculi that Elizabeth left on the shelf, in the darkness under its cover, was the Baby.  
She hated to admit it, but the only one of the little creatures that truly disturbed her was the Baby. Half the size of the others, the Baby was perched upon a miniature high chair. Its little arms and legs could barely support it. The Baby was dressed in swaddling and a bonnet, but the face that stared out from under the frills was disturbingly adult in appearance. Sometimes the Baby would laugh and play with its tiny rattles, but more often it just squalled incessantly, crying itself red-faced while watching her with beady, passionless eyes.  
The Baby gave her the creeps. Elizabeth was happy to leave it covered and silent and out of sight. It was the only one of the Homunculi that she and Henry were in unspoken agreement never to use in one of their shows.  
Elizabeth was so focused on her sewing and amused by the little creatures that she did not hear the cabin door creep open. First a dirty hand reached inside, easing the door wider, slowly, silently. Then a rough featured, stubble covered face peered inside. The carnival worker’s eyes were not bleary with drink now, but were sharp and glittering, the eyes of a predator. A smile that was more than half sneer crept onto his lips.   
The dirty ruffian was one of the many such men who attached themselves to the carnival for a short time, paying for transportation from one town to another with hard work. Rudolph, the carnival owner, never asked questions of such men. He took them on as needed, paid them as little as possible, and just shrugged when they eventually wandered off. This particular man had joined the carnival in Reigelsberg and Rudolph was unaware that he was wanted for both rape and murder.  
Now, with practiced ease, the Reigelsberg Ripper slide across the floor until he was nearly in arm’s reach of his prey. Elizabeth’s first warning of approaching peril came from the sour body odor that wafted off of the man. She wrinkled her nose at the smell and started to turn around. One calloused hand clamped over her mouth while the other grabbed her by the shoulders.  
Her eyes went wide, but her scream was muffled.  
“Hello, Pretty.” Crooned her assailant.  
Elizabeth immediately began to thrash and kick, the memory of The Monster’s assault on what was supposed to be her wedding night rose like a blister in her mind. Her foot crashed against the workbench, spilling the canisters with their squeaking contents on the floor. Her assailant was momentarily caught off guard by the ferocity of her resistance, but with gritted teeth and grunts of exertion, he managed to pin her on the caravan floor.   
She went limp and uttered a banshee wail of such utter terror and hopelessness that the hardened murderer’s blood ran cold. He had no way of knowing that his victim’s eyes were seeing a face even more grotesque and monstrous than his own, a face with dead gray skin and hooded lids, with an angry snarl twisted by more pain than any human could ever know.  
The Reigelsberg Ripper paused in his assault, clamping both hands over Elizabeth’s mouth to try to stifle that blood-curdling wail. He didn’t feel the first few drops of liquid pattering down on his back. It was only after the dripping became a steady cold stream in the middle of his shirt, soaking through the fabric to his skin beneath that he paid any heed to it.  
“What the Devil?” He growled.  
Crashing Elizabeth’s head against the floor to stun her, he turned round to see where the spill was coming from.  
An unstoppered flask of lantern oil lie on its side on a shelf above him. To his horror, a tiny figure with wicked features, dressed in a black suit with a red satin lined cape stood next to the bottle. The little figure smiled sardonically and bowed.  
There was a scritch to his left. The murderer turned to look.  
The tiny Archbishop was standing on a nearby stool with a lit wooden match in his hands. He held it like a staff, mad glee beaming from his face.  
The Homunculi let out a squeaky, screech that was almost discernible as the words, “Burn, Sinner! Burn!”  
Then the creature hurled its wooden match like a spear.  
It landed square in the center of the man’s back and immediately set his oil-drenched shirt alight. The man screamed and clawed at his back, trying to pull the flaming shirt off. Elizabeth, his intended victim, was wholly forgotten.  
In seconds the flames from the furiously burning shirt set his hair alight as well.  
The Reigelsberg Ripper leaped to his feet and staggered across the cabin and out the door, howling in agony and leaving a hazy trail of blue smoke in his wake.  
The Devil looked across at the Archbishop, who still gesticulated wildly in a squealy fit of righteous indignation, and applauded in admiration.  
Elizabeth moaned from the floor, slowly recovering from the horrific flashback that had gripped her. She grabbed a sharp tool off the floor and began to look around for her assailant.  
Quickly, the two tiny Homunculi scurried for cover and disappeared before she could spot them.  
Carnival workers arrived at the door, calling out for her. Heta and Greta, the Siamese Twins, pushed through the door sideways and rushed to her side. Four hands helped her to her feet and brushed at her hair, two voices squeaked in dismay at the blood on the back of her head. Heta cried with distress while Greta murmured consoling words.  
The Twins waited with her along with a couple of other carnival workers the Heinrichs had become friends with, until Henry came rushing back, pushing frantically through the crowd of fair-goers in the streets outside.  
Calls and alarms went out, soon a mob of angry carnival workers and townspeople were combing the streets for the would-be murderer, but no sign of him was found.  
The Reigelsberg Ripper left only a charred shirt and the smell of burnt flesh behind him as he fled the town.


End file.
